M31 - Andromeda Galaxy

M31 taken from WYAS 16th Oct 2012 by Tim Beale

This is my first proper image taken with the aid of an auto-guider!
It was taken from the observing pad outside WYAS using a Canon EOS550D and William Optics Zenithstar 80ED. The mount was my Skywatcher EQ5, modified with a soldering iron to hook up to a Shoestring Astronomy GPUSB adaptor and PHD Guiding. The guidescope was a butchered Skywatcher 9x50 finderscope with a Philips SPC900 webcam on the back. Quite possibly the cheapest autoguiding setup available, but very effective!
The image is a stack of twelve 2-minute exposures at ISO800, with five dark frames. Processed using DeepSkyStacker and Photoshop CS5. Very little cropping was done, which shows how large this object actually is. M32 and M110 satellite galaxies can also be seen.
On my next attempt, I will try to capture around 20-30 light frames rather than 12 and also try and get some flat frames to better balance the background.

M42 Orion Nebula October 7th 2012

These are updated images using my 8" Celestron SCT with guiding. It replaces and improves on an image taken in March 2012 unguided.

These image was taken on the 7th October 2012 at the WYAS observatory telescope pad, taken between 02:20am and 04:15am. It was a very clear night and not too cold.

These two images were taken with an exposure of 120 seconds using a Canon 40D DSLR, QHY5 guide camera and 50mm guidescope.

The top image is ISO 400, 12 x 120sec exposure giving a total of 24 minutes exposure.

The lower image is ISO 640, 15 x 120sec exposure giving a total of 30 minutes in total.

Images taken using a RAW format. These were processed totally in Photoshop. Opened, initially modifed to enhance the gas clouds and saved. Then using the HDR option, the images were stacked and processed for the final image. 

 

M57 Ring Nebula

The Ring Nebula appears in the northern constellation of Lyra.  It is a prominent example of a planetary nebula.  This is a shell of ionized gas expelled into the surrounding interstellar medium by a red giant star, which was passing through the last stage in its evolution before becoming a white dwarf.

This image was taken using an 8" SCT, a Canon 40D DSLR. It is a composite image of  10 x 70sec images at ISO 640 stacked in RegiStax and final processing in Photoshop.

NGC6888 in Cygnus. This is a LRGB image taken in less than good conditions due to incoming cloud. Consequently only 30 minutes of exposure was obtained.

Moon 6th October 2012

This is an image of the Moon taken at 02:10am Saturday 6th October 2012.

Taken using a Celestron 8" SCT on the Large Pier on the WYAS observatory telescope pad using a 40D Canon DSLR.

The final image is a composite of images taken at ISO 125.    4 x 1/40th sec, 32 x 1/40th sec, 44 x 1/60th sec.  each set stacked in RegiStax and then each stacked image finally stacked for the final composite.

Hi again, remember back last May, well that was the last time I was at WYAS busy lad don't you know! My first attempt at astrophotograpy how chuffed was I.

I.O.W. Sept 2012

Well I thought it was a fairly good picture until I put it on here and can't rotate it portrait. It's saved in portrait. Any ideas guys?